


Baby Teeth

by Reneehart



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Child Abuse, Consensual Somnophilia, Consensual Underage Sex, F/M, Implied Sexual Abuse, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, Incest, M/M, Manipulation, Psychological Thriller, Underage Drinking, Violence against Children, Will is sixteen when he and Hannibal's relationship becomes sexual, but NOT of Will or Hannibal, inappropriate use of the daddy kink, tags added as i think of them, they are not biologically related but i would rather tag to be safe, though it is not explicitly described or shown
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-16 09:15:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29451396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reneehart/pseuds/Reneehart
Summary: During an investigation of a gruesome crime scene, Jack Crawford makes a startling discovery: a young, frightened boy, covered in blood and refusing to make eye contact. Too traumatized to even speak of the things he’s seen, there are no matches to existing missing children report. Just as he’s about to be turned over to child services, Doctor Hannibal Lecter selflessly decides to take him into his care. His motives well hidden from the FBI behind the facade of a concerned psychiatrist, he’s curious about the boy and obsessed with discovering the secret buried deep in his subconscious.But as the years pass and Will grows into a young man, he begins to suspect he’s less innocent than he pretends to be. And Will’s secrets aren’t the only ones in danger of coming to the surface.
Relationships: Alana Bloom/Hannibal Lecter, Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 68
Kudos: 203





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> WARNINGS: Canon typical violence, violence against children, psychological manipulation, sexually explicit content, underage, for all intents and purposes- incest. Will is twelve years old at the beginning of the fic, progressing in age until he is sixteen. While the physical aspects of his relationship with Hannibal don’t begin until he is sixteen, and while they are not biologically related, because of the nature of their relationship I’ve chosen to tag this as incest. Yes, I understand it is not the same but as always, I prefer to overtag to deter people who would prefer to avoid such content. There is also, inherently, a degree of grooming that will always go hand in hand with such dynamics, and anyone who is uncomfortable by the above warnings should proceed with caution or move on to a fic more suited to your tastes. This fic also contains character death, but it is not of Will or Hannibal.
> 
> Use the tags and warnings to curate your own experiences for a safe and fun fandom experience.

Jack Crawford considered himself a man of composure.

He had seen many things in his career within the Behavioral Analysis Unit; horrors and monstrosities that burrowed within his brain. Things which sat before the shadowed canvas of his eyelids, a specter of cruelty that lingered long after he left the office.

Some things impressed upon you this way. Tattoos that might fade though never fully, colors bleeding in aging flesh.

The scene before him was one such thing.

 _Gruesome_ , was the only world he could call to mind. He stood in a home that had been turned to a graveyard, the scent of death a pungent and cloying cloud in the air. Putrid flesh rotting from bone; or, at least, what little flesh remained. Ivory bones stained pink and chewed, the porous surface burrowed into by teeth.

The mask he wore did little to filter the scent; paltry when stood up against the heat of a Louisiana summer. The air was thick and balmy, as solid as the stained walls of the home. Water damaged, discolored from nicotine, and fallen into disrepair. Each step forward felt like strangulation, an oppression, and once more his chest clenched, ached for the lives that had come to an end here.

For the floor which had a taste for blood, so used to being fed on it.

Crime scene techs stood in full hazmat gear, cleaning what they could to make their work a more hospitable location without altering the crime scene too much.

A crime scene that had been disturbed too much already, undiscovered until the smell of fetid rot became too great and slipped through the walls, carried on a breeze to the homes nearby. Several reports to the local police station had prompted them to perform a welfare visit where they found the remains of the homeowner, bloated and half-masticated. Consumed by the strays that wandered the poor and derelict neighborhood.

The horrors only grew the further into the home they traveled until Jack was pulled from his home office in West Virginia and onto the next flight, his team traveling beside him.

Several bodies had been unearthed, buried in the soft ground that surrounded the property. Small, fractured skeletons that had long since been destroyed by the elements. Children, prepubescent. Boys, though Beverly Katz and her team were withholding proper analysis of the skeletons until they were beneath the glaring lights of a sterile lab. A process that would take some time, as each passing hour brought with it a new and equally horrific discovery.

Fresher kills buried deeper within the surrounding woods; bloated corpses in various states of decay pulled from the algae-rich water of the river that bisected the property. 

They had been wrapped and weighted down, held in place against the sluggish currents of the water. Discovered with the forensic tools that had been passed over as they tried to find each and every unmarked grave.

"What are we up to?" He asked, stepping within the kitchen that had been turned into a mock office for the techs.

"Thirteen, but we think there's more. Unless our guy went into a several year-long hiatus, the count is probably at least twice as much," Beverly said, her voice distorted through the mechanics of her mask. Even with the corpse removed, the smell of death lingered. Permeating the upholstery and seeped into the walls. 

The home would be torn down once the investigation came to a close, Jack knew.

"Any idea yet of what killed our killer?" He asked, raising a brow and folding his arms across his chest.

"It's hard to tell. There wasn't much left by the time we got to him," Zeller said, glancing up from the tablet he was bent over, flicking through a report. "A back door was left open and based on the-" he paused, grimacing as he glanced around- "amount and variety of fecal matter, quite a few animals got to him first. If I had to guess, blunt force trauma to the head. He was found in the bathroom, water on the floor. Probably slipped and-" He clicked his tongue, the sharp sound accompanied by his hand slapping against the side of his head. A crude pantomime to the lonely death.

Jack hummed, disappointed by the anti-climatic end. How unfair it was, death a much tidier end than the trial he might have faced. The coffin was only slightly smaller than the prison cell he should have occupied- larger than the shallow graves of the children he killed. 

Some cases left a bitter film to coat his tongue, souring each breath. The cases where there were no happy if traumatized reunions, tear-stained smiles as families hugged each other tight. 

Just DNA to process, to run against missing person reports and families to contact.

The screen door croaked open, a handler stepping through with one of the unit's cadaver dogs- claws clicking against the sagging linoleum floor. 

"We found another one, North past the-" the sentence came to an abrupt end, amputated in the space between them as the dog lurched forward. Its nostrils flared, jaw separating in a low whine and it was dragging the handler toward a door tucked beneath the stairs. 

"What the hell is that?" Jack asked, narrowing his eyes as the dog sniffed at the bottom of the door, pawing erratically against it so it trembled on its hinges.

"Closet, but there's access to the crawl space through it," Bev said, tipping her head curiously to the side as she watched the dog. "We cleared the interior of the house yesterday though. Nothing was in there."

"Something's in there now," Jack muttered, stepping toward the closet. He made a shooing gesture, the dog stepping back to sit obediently beside the man holding its leash.

He reached for the flashlight in his pocket at the same time as he reached for the handle, raising the device and flicking the button so that the small space was bathed in light as the door swung open.

The glow of the flashlight fell upon stacked boxes, worn and labeled with messy scrawl. Cobwebs hung in the corners like adornments, a thick layer of dust that had been disturbed when they tore through the house the day earlier. 

He swung the light in slow arcs, coming to an abrupt halt when it fell on a set of sneakers- only just visible from behind the boxes. 

Jack stilled, letting the light settle on the shoes. Small, the white strip of the sole stained red. Something clumped against the fabric and clung to the laces. Thick and red-

Organ tissue, he surmised. Meat from the remains of the corpse, alerting the dog with the scent of its rot. 

There had been no prints trailed through the house though, no sign that someone had wandered through the fresh crime scene and he wondered how old the tissue was.

Or, perhaps the wearer had simply cleaned up after themselves.

His free hand lowered to the gun on his hip, pulling it from the holster and knocking the hammer back with a resonating click. A click he spoke over, raising his voice to a pitch just short of too loud as he called out, "hello?"

There came no response, only the scuffle as the sneakers- _feet_ \- jerked back behind the boxes.

"My name is Jack Crawford, I'm with the FBI," he said in warning, stepping further into the closet, bowing his head as the ceiling sloped down beneath the steps. It was cramped, knees buckling to shorten his height. "Come out with your hands up."

There was the sound of others moving in line behind him, curiously peering around the frame of the closet. “A partner?” he heard Zeller say, voice lost to the din of his own thoughts. There were no other known individuals living at the house, the neighbors reporting that the man who lived and died here had been solitary, keeping to himself. Quiet. 

Strange that a partner would linger on a property so overwhelmed by police presence.

He extended a leg out, catching the corner of the lower box against the arch of his foot and using it to pull the boxes back at an angle. It allowed for more room, and he twisted his body, took a large step forward with his gun raised and-

He blinked, dropping his gun down as if holding it upward was too much of a risk at the sight before him. Curled behind the boxes and startling at Jack’s sudden presence, was a child.

A _frightened_ child, he amended as the young boy gasped- eyes falling to the gun even as it was stowed away and pressing himself flat against the wall. As though he might disappear through it if he only tried hard enough.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Jack said, his tone light and soft- a jarring change from the command that had filled it only seconds earlier. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m a police officer, okay?”

The boy didn’t respond, eyes pinched closed and jaw clenched. He was small, cowering in on himself; long and lank curls brushing against his jaw- overgrown and dirty. Dust and dirt created a patch across his skin and clothes- acquired from crawling through the small and unclean spaces of the home.

How long had he been here? Lurking through the passages, hiding from the officers moving in and out of the home?

Jack’s brow knitted in all the questions that turned in his mind, each curiouser than the next. There would be time for that later though, he decided, glancing down to the dried blood staining his oversized clothes.

Reholstering his weapon, he bent forward, trying to catch the boy’s eyes as he asked, “are you hurt?”

Again, no response. His eyes and lips clamped close, jaw twitching with the stubborn refusal to speak; to so much as look up at Jack. 

He pursed his lips, taking a step back. He was unsure of how long he had been here for, but it was clear he had been the final victim in a long line of too many. They knew nothing about their Unsub other than his identity, the profile too late and too incomplete without the full analysis of the crimes that had gone unnoticed for so long. Who the children were, how long ago they had been killed. How long they were kept and the horrors they were subjected to before meeting an untimely and cruel fate. 

Though he could guess, discern some truths from the rigid tremble that wracked the small frame. No less than a year, he surmised, lips curling in disgust even as he tried to temper the repulsion. A delicate matter- and he had already frightened him.

“Katz,” he said, taking a step back without looking away from the crumpled form. “Have Zeller call a medic and clear out the house for some breathing room. I need you in here.”

There was the shuffle as the room behind him was cleared, Bev standing beside the door as he stepped through- still keeping his gaze trained on the boy.

“What have we got?” she asked, the words a low whisper- mindful of the precarious situation.

“A boy. Hard to gauge his age...ten, maybe? I didn’t see any visible injuries but he’s covered in dried blood,” he said, offering a furtive glance. Her nose crinkled in repulsion, lips twisted.

“Could be his. Could be from the dead body he was living around for a week,” she mumbled. She blinked then, adding, “why would he stay here though? Wouldn’t you...run?”

“Run where?” Jack countered, the words solemn. “Depending on how long since he was taken, this could be all he knows.” 

She clicked her tongue then, saying nothing else as she slipped past him to move into the closet.

In the end, it took half an hour to coax him out. He had been no more receptive to Beverly than he had been Jack, and there was a brief, harrowing moment where they considered prying him out with apologies and force. What a stroke of ingenuity it was when Bev stepped outside for several minutes before returning, a dog in tow. Cadaver dogs weren’t the most social of canines- obedient and well-trained- and there was something morbidly humorous to the thought of using such an animal for a task. 

But it had _worked_ , the boy crawling out to run hesitant hands down the soft fur and coo gently at the dog. Still no words offered, his gaze avoidant as if hoping the EMTs and techs crowding him would simply vanish should he ignore them for long enough. Questions for his name went unanswered, and for the sake of not referring to him with an indignant term that would simply reduce him to a victim of his circumstances, they called him Adam.

Named for Code Adam, the national system used to refer to a lost child.

  
  
  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alana arrives to bridge the distance between "Adam" and the BAU; meanwhile, headway is made in making an identification, though it offers little hope

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was going to post this in two weeks but I'm drunk and In A Mood so enjoy.
> 
> WARNING: This chapter contains mentions of violence against children and child abuse of both a neglectful, sexual and physical nature. None of this is explained in detail, but mentioned in reference to other characters.

_Adam_ was underneath the bed once he awoke from the sluggish crawl of the medications they had plied him with when he panicked upon entering the hospital. It was the more humane option, kinder than the use of the restraints that sat as a last resort for patients with such behavioral issues. His fear had been a visceral thing, eyes wide at the crowded triage center, his chest rising and falling in rapid and unsteady breaths.

They were planning to move him into a private room as soon as one was prepared but the spaces between the ambulance and the pediatric unit were too large of a gap. Too chaotic.

Too overwhelming, hands clamping over his ears to drown out the beeping of machines that was a constant blare. The burst of crackling voices over the speaker system. His legs rose, knees to chest and feet curling over the soft seat of the wheelchair as he made himself smaller than his already slight frame. 

Tears cut down his ruddy, dirt-mottled face, eyes pinched tightly together. The curtain dividing the room from the others- offering a sliver of privacy amid too many people- did little to ease his panic which mounted until he was screaming.

His voice was pitched and hoarse from the sheer force of his cries, and they tried to be as gentle as they could as they slid the needle into the soft flesh of his bottom. He slumped over in the arms of the nurse who held him, red streaks dragged down her arms and the contours of her face from where his nails scrambled against her. 

They worked quickly to complete all his tests as long as the drug was in his veins and he was ignorant to the loud whir of the machines and the back and forth between departments.

Jack stayed with him through it all, letting Katz return to her work processing the remains of the other boys.

What use was he now that their killer sat in half-consumed pieces in a body bag? 

There was a fondness for the child, a desire to protect thick behind his ribs. Righteous anger seared within his belly of what terrors he was already subjected to that made him respond to the flurry of activity and doctors and policemen with fear and cries rather than relief. He stayed with him until it was late in the evening and he stepped outside, motivated by the gurgle of his stomach to find something to eat and call Bella.

She had a way of smoothing the frayed edges of his day, her cutting wit and gentle voice a balm for all the horrid things he’d seen. So he sat in his car, parked beneath the golden ring of light offered by the streetlamps in the empty parking lot. A paper bag sat in the seat beside him, and he frowned bashfully, guiltily when Bella chided him for calling her while eating. 

“I’m multitasking,” he defended bemusedly, earning him a scoff that crinkled through the mechanical speaker. 

She was quiet a moment, then, _“you plan on spending the night at the hospital?”_

He stalled in his answer, chewing thoughtfully and slowly on the fried food. _Alligator_. The employee operating the drive-thru had suggested it, piquing his curiosity enough that the thought of an additional purchase was a nonissue. He swallowed, rubbed his fingers on a thin napkin before crumpling it and tossing it in the bag. “I was going to try. If he was okay with it.”

He wasn’t particularly looking forward to it, sleeping upright in the stiff armchair that sat in the corner beside the bed. His back and neck would ache for days after, but it was an inconvenience he could contend with. 

_“When do you think you’ll find his family? I couldn’t imagine what they’ve been through.”_

He sighed, resting his elbow on the lip of the window. “It depends. We’ll run his photo through some software, start small. Local, then surrounding counties. State, surrounding states. It’s rare kids are brought over state lines but not impossible. It's smart in terms of...forensics so..." he trailed off, letting his gaze follow the pass of cars as they sped down the highway. "Hopefully soon.”

She hummed her agreement, tongue clucking gently against the roof of her mouth. He could envision her, sat in the corner of the couch, illuminated by the glow of the table lamp beside her. One hand curled over the wide well of a wineglass, the other holding the phone against her ear as she shook her head in dismay. Wearing her robe, perhaps. Unwinding from her own job- demanding in a different way.

“Do you ever think of having kids?” he asked suddenly, less for a desire to have such a serious conversation in the parking lot of an establishment marked with a cartoon catfish than it was a change in topic. He’d rather their talk be light, something he could hold within him as he returned to the hospital.

She laughed at the prompt. _“Now?”_

“No time like the present,” he teased, chuckling at the strained pitch in her voice. 

_“We work too much,”_ she said, her tone still rich with humor. _“And you’d have an aneurysm. How you’re feeling now? Multiply that by one hundred and keep it there.”_

He scowled at having his ploy so easily seen through. Still, he clutched at the easier exchange and said, “a dog then?”

She laughed.

They spoke for fifteen more minutes before finally sharing their goodbyes. The car seemed that much colder, that much emptier when he hung up. He drove back to the hospital in that same stilted silence, and it was then that he stumbled into the empty room- dim, though not darkened, still bright enough that passing staff could see through the windowed wall. 

He paused in the doorway, staring at the bed. Sheets rumpled, the blanket tossed aside. The call button sat within reach of the bed and he crossed the room, raised a hand to it before coming to an abrupt halt. 

His gaze dropped to the floor, relief filling him at the sight of a socked foot sticking out from beneath the bed. Blue, the soles etched with rubber to make them slip-resistant on the linoleum. 

Dropping to his knees, he braced his palms flat on the ground as he peered under the bed. Eyes blinked back at him, the face a barely visible disc in the shadows that encompassed the young boy.

“Hey, buddy,” he said, offering his most congenial smile. Warm and soft, not too strained. Though they had taken to calling him Adam in reference it was prudent not to do so to his face, treating it as the placeholder it was rather than his given name. Given to him by parents who said it each night in their prayers and it seemed like sacrilege, a step too far to refer to anything other than that in the meantime. “Do you want to come out?”

He was unsurprised when no response came and was quick to pivot tactics- recalling the empty cupboards and fridge of the home he had been dragged from, filled only with rotted leftovers and beer. The trash had been half-filled with tins of canned ravioli and chili, presumably eaten cold as Adam ate whatever he could before the shelves ran bare. Malnourished, the doctors had said.

“Are you hungry? The cafeteria is closed but I bet the nurses can get you something,” he offered, watching as the idea wavered over his face before being dismissed. Not so hungry then to relent the safety he felt beneath the bed and the floor. 

Jack sighed, pursing his lips as considered Adam. Several seconds passed, churning into minutes, and finally, he pushed himself up from the floor- wincing as his body protested the motion. 

He simply wasn’t built to wait out the young boy in such a way, lying supine on the hard ground. So he reached for the remote instead, finding a channel that was bright and vibrant with the cartoons that flickered across the screen. 

He sat in the chair then, watching the edge of the bed as he said, “Well, come out if you want. I’ll be here until you do.”

They remained that way for two hours, the cartoons a constant drone in the background. The noise from outside the room grew quieter as evening shifted into the night, visitors filtering out to return home and leaving only the night staff to wander through the halls. Jack saw the movement he rose from the periphery of his vision, hands settling on the mattress as he pulled himself out from under the bed. 

He sat on the opposite side of it, his glare leaving a prickle on Jack’s skin but the agent purposefully avoided his gaze. Jack’s eyes remained trained on the television, and it was another twenty minutes before he finally crawled back on the bed. His knees pulled into his chest, arms winding around them. 

Jack made no more attempts to speak with him, deciding that the simple silence between them was enough for the moment.

~x~

Jack stood in front of the windowed pane of the hospital room, his arms folded over his chest. Even in the air-conditioned hall, the heat permeated through the walls and seeped against him. Sweat slicked his brow and dampened the underarms of his shirt from the few moments he had stepped outside to speak with Katz on the phone.

There were still no hits on the missing children’s database, their _Adam_ unidentified. His photo was circulated in the hopes that someone might recognize him- recognize the blue of his iris, fractured with gold as he offered the camera a shrewd and resentful glare, wanting to avert his gaze but being denied of the comfort. Or that the rounded sculpt of his chin or tussles of dark brown curls would be seen and remembered in a child lost long ago.

There had been a handful of calls, though they led nowhere. The wrong blood type or an identifying birthmark that could not be found. So many mysteries surrounding the young boy, and each remained unanswered- an enigma that only grew and calcified.

He still had yet to speak, making it difficult to ascertain his cognitive or developmental age. Too small, malnourished and dehydrated for too long so that his growth was stunted. But his molars said what he could not, and they had placed his age at eleven or twelve. One upper molar was missing, the adult tooth erupting through the red tissue- inflamed, his dental hygiene as poor as his living situation.

Another molar- sat beneath the missing one- and it was still his baby tooth, the permanent one visible under the root in the x-rays.

Jack sighed, bringing a hand to rub at his eyes. Alana Bloom had taken the first flight out from DC to New Orleans, arriving early in the evening the night before. She sat with Adam now, relenting hope that she might coax him to speak and instead resorting to some of the toys available from the communal playroom of the children’s ward. He rose his brow at them, as if in offense at being plied with toys meant for children much younger than him, but had followed her direction regardless. Donning an almost bored expression as he slotted shaped blocks into the appropriate hole.

He reacted the same to the coloring pages she slid his way, but he sat at the table dutifully, brow pulled into an expression too stern for his young face, dragging a crayon across the paper. Alana sat beside him, her smile ever-present if insincere as she praised him and questioned him though she received no answer.

Nearly two hours had passed since the pair had first sat down together, and Jack rose a fist, rapping his knuckles against the glass window that acted as a divider between the room and corridor. Alana glanced up at it, though Adam ignored the sound, barely acknowledging the doctor as she tapped a hand to his wrist and promised to return, rising from the small seat.

Jack stepped aside as she passed through the door, making room for her to stand beside him at the window.

“Still nothing?”

She pursed her lips. “It’s still early, Jack. It takes time to develop trust.”

“I’m not decrying your process Doctor Bloom,” he began, eyes widening as he tipped his head in the direction of the young boy, still bowed over the color pages. “I’m just thinking about his family. More than enough time has passed for them. For him too, even if he doesn’t remember them.” It was a painful thought, one that made his chest ache and clench on the things cluttered behind his ribs. How long ago had he been taken? How long had his life and world been reduced to the stained walls of the blood-soaked home that sat on a bed of graves?

“We’re trying, Jack,” she said, amending after a moment, “ _he’s_ trying, Jack.”

He was shaking his head before she finished speaking. “Then why won’t he speak? The doctors didn’t find anything that might inhibit his ability. Is it a developmental thing?”

“He has spatial awareness. Understands abstract concepts like time and follows directions when I give them. He developed normally to the preoperational stage, but it’s difficult to tell beyond that since he won’t speak.” She blinked, considered her words as she said, “or can’t speak. I think it’s somatization from his trauma. There’s no physiological reason he can’t speak but the psychological distress is manifesting as a physical limitation.”

“Uh-huh,” he said, nodding in understanding as he quirked a brow. “And how do you treat somatization?”

She hesitated on the answer, chewing her lip as her gaze slanted to the window. “It’s a response to traumatic experiences. The best treatment will always be psychotherapy.”

He huffed out a bitter, humorless laugh. “So the best way to treat someone who refuses to talk is with talk therapy?” he asked, his tone cold and sardonic.

“That’s why trust is important. Once he feels safe and cared for, he’ll recognize the stressor is no longer a concern.” Her tone was pinched in frustration, arms folding across her chest as though they might act as armor to the exchange. She was silent a moment- counting down from ten, he imagined bemusedly- before turning to him once more to add, “I know you mean well, Jack. But it’s going to take time. A lot of it. That’s why you called me here, right? So I can focus on helping him while you and the guys focus on finding his family?”

He conceded on a sigh, stepping forward to bridge the distance between himself and the window. His fingers curled across the frame- painted an ugly sea-foam color, bright against the sand-colored walls- and leaned his weight forward. “I know. It’s just not right. Everything he’s been through, how long his family’s been missing him. I just wish we could figure it out so everyone can be where they need to be,” he said, a foreign solemnity to the words. The case had been _hard_. Difficult in a way he hadn’t encountered in his morbid career and it seemed an unnecessary cruelty that Adam was still so far away from returning home. To a bedroom that had sat unchanged for years, laundry still spilled on the floor, toys scattered on a rug.

He had seen such bedrooms throughout his career, preserved and suspended in a time long ago. The hurt too much, the ache too constant for most parents to approach the task. Cleaning up the belongings felt too much like an admission that hope had drifted. A missing child’s final lingering presence in a world that had moved on without them found in dirty clothes and crumpled up homework assignments.

Alana stepped forward, draping a hand over his own- smoothing the pads of her fingers across his knuckles in a gentle show of support. “Bev hasn’t found anything yet?” she asked.

He shook his head, glancing at her for only a moment before turning his gaze back to Adam. He had given up on coloring, dropping instead to his knees where he proceeded to dump a bin of Legos out onto the carpeted floor. He pieced them together, his expression pinched in thought rather than the delight that typically accompanied such play. “No. We’ve run his face through some facial recognition software but nothing’s turned up yet. He’s quite the mystery.”

He let his gaze linger, scrutinizing the mystery himself. Cleaner now, dressed in neat but still ill-fitting clothes that had been donated to the hospital, his jeans cinched with a zip-tie to hold them up on narrow hips- the sleeves of his t-shirt brushing against his elbows. His curls were soft and lustrous now that they had been washed, an overgrown halo surrounding the crown of his head.

The bruises and abrasions that littered his flesh were mostly hidden, the evidence of poorly-healed sprains and fractures invisible to an untrained eye. No evidence had been found of sexual abuse, but the doctor had been quick to amend that it didn’t negate the possibility entirely. That certain tact and mindfulness should still be given.

He stepped back from the window, shaking his head. He was little use here. Alana was right. This wasn’t his wheelhouse. All he would do was work himself into a frenzy and unnerve the attending nurses and doctors that passed behind him.

“I’m going to go back to the house. See if there’s anything that we might have missed,” he said, offering a curt goodbye before striding down the hall.

A trip that proved just as futile as his idling outside of the hospital room. There was nothing that could be found within the police-taped home. He frowned at the thin mattress set on a wrought-iron frame in the second bedroom, restraints hanging limb from the rungs. Stained and torn, springs ripping through the fabric. There were toys there as well, though unlike the ones in the hospital room they were dirty or broken. It was a grim sight, and he left the room behind- pointedly looking away from the padlocked affixed to the door.

~x~

“How are things going in here?” Jack asked as he marched into the lab, a cup of coffee warming his palm. Nearly a week had passed since they first entered the macabre home, affixed within the news as the charmingly dubbed _House of Horrors._ It was an apt name, though he was loathed to admit it, finding any moniker to be too campy for such tragedy.

Though, he supposed, camp was Lounds’s specialty.

“We’ve identified nine of the bodies, I already emailed you the reports. We haven’t started contacting family yet, we weren’t sure if you wanted to have a hand in that or divide and conquer with local police since there’s...a lot of conversations to be had,” Katz began, pulling the latex gloves from her hands with a snap. The noise resonated off the metallic surfaces of the room, a bright burst of sound.

Jack nodded, leaning against a polished table as he folded his arms across his chest. “Local PD will want in. It’s their people, their community. What else?”

Price was the next to speak sliding a tablet across the surface between them and flicking down the report. “It looks like each boy was abducted anywhere from age five to age nine, and kept for several months to a year. Cause of death among all of them appears to be strangulation, and there’s evidence of torture, malnutrition, and sexual assault.”

Jack grimaced at the words, nodding all the same in reluctant understanding. He had been expecting so much, though preparation never eased the ache. The borrowed regret that their last few moments of life had been so bleak.

“There’s…one other thing we found,” Katz said, hesitating on the words as she glanced up at Jack from beneath the fan of her lashes. “Good news and bad news. The good news is the lab finally finished processing all the DNA and Zeller realized something when we were making comparisons and running data.” She produced two sets of film from within a folder, setting them down on the table. Each contained a DNA sequence, Jack's untrained gaze bouncing between the two with little understanding of their importance. “You see these two sets, how similar they are?”

Her pointed fingers drew lines between the two, pointing to several marks that most have been of interest to catch her eyes. “Similar, yeah. Not the same though.”

“They wouldn’t be. Children share only half their DNA with their father,” Zeller interjected, raising a brow in emphasis of his words. “The reason Adam isn’t showing up on any missing person’s report is he was never reported missing. Because the killer is his father.”

“Cyril Graham’s the father?’ Jack asked, his voice louder than he intended for it to be upon the revelation. His jaw fell, slackening with the information, and his gaze bounced between the three of them, waiting for them to finish the act that had set out upon. Yet, no follow-up came, no more grand declarations and he slapped his palm to the table, his voice a firm command as he asked, “Well, what about his mother? Have you found his birth certificate?”

“That’s the bad news. There’s...nothing,” Katz said after a moment of stilted trepidation, sighing when it became apparent the two others had defaulted to her to pass along the bad news. “We looked as hard as we could but there’s no document that he ever existed. At least not in relation to his father. No birth records, hospital records, school records. Unless his mother neglected to name Graham as the father, it looks like he was born at home without any assistance.”

Jack pinched his lips, eyes narrowing into a glower that prompted Price to add, “We even combed back through interviews with neighbors and coworkers and they all said that Graham was a loner. No one else lived in the house, as far as they were concerned.”

He chewed his lips, sputtering on his words as he swallowed the less kind ones. It seemed the final twist in a long line of cruelties doled against the young boy.

All the things he imagined for him, the hope that he might return to a loving home crumbled before him- leaving only rubble and a cloud of dust to billow out before him. He thought once more of a child’s room, frozen in time. Dinosaur sheets faded and bleached from the sun that filtered in from the windows. The scene shifted, disjointed until it was of the room on the second floor. Bare mattress and a bed with restraints.

They were one and the same, the room he had left behind and the one that had been his prison. Raised in a graveyard, crowded by the ghosts of children like him and a violent father.

But what about the mother?

“We can revisit them, see if anyone remembers a woman in his life,” he said after a moment, inhaling sharply in an attempt to reign in the tenuous hold of his control. “Only children’s bodies were found, right? No adults?”

He was unsure which was worse. A mother that abandoned him to live with such a man, amid such squalor or pain. Or a mother who had been killed by his father, simply collateral in the violence that framed his short life.

How much had Adam seen? What horrors had he been privy to?

“None. If he did kill her, it’s possible he dumped her elsewhere,” Katz said, frowning as she shook her head. “Not his usual type, wouldn’t feel the need to keep her as close as he did the boys. Especially when he already had their child together.”

“He was probably born in that house, then. Hasn’t known anything else,” he muttered below his breath. A life devoid of the standard dressings of childhood. No school to attend, no doctors to ensure he was healthy. No playgrounds or birthday parties, trapped in a home that was a parade of death.

“So what happens now? Graham had no living relatives, and without a mother to turn him over to...he doesn’t have a family to go to,” Zeller asked, frowning as he shuffled the assorted prints into a pile, his gaze accusatory as if the DNA was at fault.

“I’ll file the paperwork to have him moved to a care facility closer to DC so he can continue his therapy with Doctor Bloom. She’s right, he needs trust and stability and she could offer that for him. But long-term custody will be moved to the state. Eventually, he’ll be turned to the foster care facility.”

Katz narrowed her eyes, folding her arms across her chest. “Foster care isn’t exactly known for stability.”

His instinct was to growl that _he knew_ . That he was aware of how mishandled such delicate cases tended to be in the overwhelmed system. But what was there to be done? They would continue to search for his mother, try to find a neighbor, postman, grocer- _somebody_ \- who might know of the vanished woman. But it was a search with no guarantees, no certainties that she was even still alive to be found.

Perhaps Adam knew, he considered for a moment- once more wondering just how much was locked away behind the stubborn lips. Did he remember his mother? Remember her leaving?

Remember her death?

It was the only thread he could clutch at, aware even as he thought of it how futile it was. They still didn’t even know his name, the blank space only marginally less cumbersome now that they knew Graham to be the surname. A near week had passed, and though he warmed to Doctor Bloom slowly, it was not enough for him to speak.

Content, it seemed, to sit in silence forever.

“It’s not ideal, but we can have Bloom head his treatment team and ensure she stays with him wherever he goes. Try to find a home more equipped to someone with such special needs,” he said, flourishing a hand through the air, knowing it was not enough.

But it was all they had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who's commented so far with such nice words! I'm glad this little story is being enjoyed so far.
> 
> NEXT UP: Alana and Jack make attempts to get "Adam" to open up as they prepare to move him to Johns Hopkins in Baltimore and our favorite cannibal is finally introduced.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The puzzle surrounding "Adam" only seems to grow as he is moved from Louisiana to Maryland, and Hannibal offers some insight onto the case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m a clown, so this chapter is about twice as long as it’s meant to be. Oops.

Alana was waiting for Jack at the entrance to the hospital, fingers running through her hair to brush the dark tousles from her face. Her locks had succumbed to the heat and humidity of Louisiana, splitting and frizzing in a fan around her slim face. The underarms of her blouse were damp with sweat, hands curling around the crumpled bottle of half-drank water. It crinkled noisily as he approached, beads of condensation wetting her palm.

“Well?” she began, her tone impatient. “You said in your message Bev made a match?”

He frowned when he came to a halt beside her, hands sliding in his pockets as he looked out to the sky stretched before them. The day was overcast, gray clouds a thick swath around the world. It called to mind funeral shrouds, medical gauze fitted tightly around an open wound.

“Yes...to our killer,” he said, stretching the words out in a slow admission. Alana blinked at him, nostrils flaring as she shucked in a breath and he added, “he’s Graham’s son.”

He watched as the words settled into her mind, realization blossoming across her pinched features. She parted her lips, whatever words she had meant to say dying on her tongue before she swallowed them back and frowned. Her brow knitted, and after several stilted seconds she asked, “well, did we figure his name out then?” Her voice was strained, and she cleared her throat as if in punctuation.

Jack shook his head. “No birth certificate that we’ve found yet. We’re trying to identify his mother but we’re not feeling too optimistic.” He paused, sighing before he continued, “Katz is comparing his DNA to the DNA of remains found from cold cases involving a woman in the last twelve years. It’s not much but it’s something.”

Her eyes pressed closed, a hand raised to rub at the bridge of her nose. “He has no one, is what you’re saying?”

“Not necessarily. If we can find his mother alive, he has her or maybe she had family he can be turned over to,” he added hastily, trying to smooth the jagged edges of the moment. “If not than there’s no reason he needs to stay here. We can have him transferred closer to DC so you can stay on as his therapist. He’ll have you.”

She scoffed, glancing away as she pushed her curling hair behind her ear, the lock slipping loose seconds later. “It’s a sweet sentiment, Jack, but I’m not a substitute for a mother.”

“Hopefully he’ll get that eventually. We’ll try to find him a good foster home, one with experience dealing with delicate cases.” She pursed her lips, though the tension in her mien eased in slow, unfurling increments. It may not have been the answer she was hoping for, but it was, if nothing else, an answer. Something they had so little of and though this one curdled in his gut it was a tangible connection.

A fixed point- an axis- that they might settle on. The first dot to connect to others in a constellation that would form the shape of the young boy they desperately sought to understand.

He sighed, folding his arms over his chest as he lowered his gaze. He knew even as he said the words that Alana would disagree with them, both of them headstrong in their respective ways. “You know I have to ask him about his parents.”

She whipped her head around to consider him, gray eyes narrowed. “I don’t think that will go well, Jack. He still won’t talk to me, and I think he’s illiterate or at least extremely delayed because he won’t write and doesn’t seem interested in reading. You might get a head shake or nod, but not much else.”

“There are ways he can answer us without verbal responses. Body language, stuff like that.”

“What? You mean triggering him and then gauging his reaction? Jack, _no,”_ she said, emphasizing the word with such finality that he fell quiet a moment, taking a single step back. Her gaze had turned steely and her rounded chin was raised in determination, arms crossed firmly over her chest.

She was so protective of her patients- a habit that often served as their basis for most of their arguments. Yet it was precisely that protectiveness that he wanted when he called her down to Louisiana several days prior. Family therapy was her specialty yet her methods often diverged from his own more confrontational ones.

He valued it- truly he did. But what good would time do when it already felt as if they had run up a clock? When each passing second without a place for Adam to call home felt like another cruelty placed upon his small shoulders? “If it could help us find his mother-”

“What if she was killed?” she interjected, voice pitched as she made a sharp and divisive gesture through the air with her hand. “What if she was killed and he saw it?”

His brows rose at the prompt. “You don’t think I haven’t considered that, Doctor Bloom? Trust me, I don’t like the idea of traumatizing him further or making him relive any of the stuff he’s been through either but we need to know something. We’re grasping at straws and he might be able to tell us.” He was more than aware of what he was asking; Graham had been a violent man. A _monster_. From the moment he learned of the monster's link to the young boy it was the first thing to come to his mind.

He was almost certain there was no mother to be found. But he had to _try._

“The nurses told me he talks in his sleep sometimes. I’ve asked them to leave transcripts of everything he says,” Alana said after several seconds slipped past of uneasy silence, her voice low and solemn.

He blinked at that, surprise blossoming on his face. “Why didn’t you tell me? What does he say?” he asked, voice tinged with urgency.

“ _Stop. Don’t. Help._ Nothing good,” she said, lips twisting into a deep frown that created parentheses to frame her lips. “Don’t make it any worse, Jack.”

He swallowed, nodding once in concession. “Can you ask him?”

It was a question he expected a succinct and final answer to; _no._ Yet, she was silent a moment, ruminating on it for what felt like an eternity before tipping her head and saying, “Indirectly. I can ask him to draw a family portrait.”

~x~

Adam disliked the communal areas of the hospital. _Shy,_ the nurses called him. Overwhelmed by the noise and excitement of the other children as they filled the playroom. They tried to shuffle him in, hoping it would do him some good. The socialization with peers his own age rather than the doctors and attendants that too often made his company.

Each attempt fared worse than the last, resulting in Adam either seating himself as far away as he could manage, a dour expression pinching his slim face. Or what could only be described as a tantrum- a behavior inappropriate for someone of his age, dropping to the floor in a weighted heap and pouting once it was made clear where the path of his trajectory was headed.

It was for this reason that they sat in his private room rather than any of the ones more suited for such a task. He felt safer in the small space, tethering himself to the rhythmic beeping of the machines and the low din of the television set.

There were a few toys in the space- stolen from the communal rooms to keep him occupied with something other than the screen affixed to the wall or his own turbulent thoughts. Books of varying reading levels that he hadn’t touched and a small arts and crafts kit that Alana suspected was opened for the first time, the plastic lid flipped back to reveal the assorted crayons and markers.

Ignored, left within the small compartment. Adam sat at his desk, feet kicking out from under him in a nervous expulsion of energy.

He wasn’t the only one prone to such fits, she mused.

“Stop prowling, Jack,” Alana hissed beneath her breath, glancing over her shoulder to glare at Jack as he came to an abrupt stop beside the window. He scowled, leaning his hip against the sill and crossing his arms.

“I’m not _prowling_ ,” he answered, but he did as he was told, settling his weight as he propped himself beside the window. Satisfied, she turned from him, letting her gaze fall back on the young boy as he bowed over the craft paper. They sat in silence, her crossed foot tapping the leg of the desk as if a pendulum- keeping time to the task.

He sat back when he was done, sliding the page across the surface between them- dropping the colored pencil with little care for where it fell. It rolled across the surface, settling against the pile of assorted colors.

Her eyes glanced to them, noting with a strained smile that he had used only the color black- barely considering the more vibrant colors that sat beside his elbow. “All done?” she asked, turning her attention back to the portrait held in her hands.

He responded with poorly concealed annoyance at having been given the task, and perhaps it was his frustration that led to such defiance in depicting his family. But the drawing was sparse, utilitarian. Drawn in firm black lines and crude in details- his fine-motor skills better than his artistic ones- were several characters placed on negative space.

No backgrounds, no settings to play home for the figures. A flat drawing that met the bare requirements of her request. It was not entirely unlike the decals one might find on the back window of an SUV, separated family members existing together but not in cohesion.

She set it down, smiling at him as she asked, “Which one are you?”

He was slow to respond, extending a hand outward and pointing to a figure in the middle. Smaller, though not dramatically so. The proportions in relation to the other figures were nothing of note- it was simply bland. Detached.

“And is this your father?” she asked, pointing to a larger figure beside his own. There were few discerning characteristics between the bare drawings, and only the height and the lazily drawn curls on Adam’s figure defined them.

He gave a stiff nod.

She slid her finger to another drawing- a female, denoted by the long hair that fell to the mid-waist. “Is this your mother?”

He hesitated, fingers twisting together as he played with his own hands. He sat in such a way that the back legs of his chair rose, his weight propped on the table. Just as she was ready to prompt him again, certain he was ignoring her, he nodded.

It was the purpose of the whole project, discovering the identity of his mother- or where she might be. Be it alive and distant from the family she abandoned or cold in the ground. Yet, it seemed of little importance at the moment, overshadowed by something else on the paper. Another figure, smaller than Adam’s own self-portrait had been.

“Who is this?” she asked, pointing at the little caricature. A blank figure, with no discerning features.

Adam glanced up at her, eyes wide. His shoulders rolled in a slow shrug, yet he tipped his head to the side as if in wait; expectant of her guess.

She hesitated a moment, the second stretched out and elongated as she offered several slow blinks. “Do you have a brother?” she asked, the words slow and stunted in enunciation.

Once more, he nodded.

“What?” Jack asked- suddenly, the sound an abrupt and jarring puncture into the room. He stood behind them, hands on his hips as he looked down at the offending drawing, his gaze accusatory. Adam startled at his presence behind him, dropping his weight back so the chair clattered noisily against the floor.

Jack glanced at him, cognizant of his error, and frowned. His voice was softer, calmer as he asked, “A brother?”

Adam looked up at him, head craned back so his chin pointed to the ceiling. A look he held for only two seconds before dropping his gaze with a nod.

“Where is he? Where’s your brother?” Alana asked, reaching her hand outward in a slow gesture- one meant for him to see before she folded her palm over the top of his hand. He blinked down at it- her manicured nails painted in pale pink polish, chipping from wear in the corners. A slim golden ring bearing a solitaire diamond that had belonged to her grandmother.

Letting his one hand remain beneath her palm, he brought the other to tap against the drawing- pointing to the rudimentary figure of his mother. Long hair, the curved line of her mouth tipped downward in a severe frown.

All of the figures were frowning, she noted.

“With your mom? Okay, that’s good. That’s great,” she praised, offering an encouraging smile. “Do you know where your mom and brother are?”

He pursed his lips, slumping back against the chair. His chin fell forward and the hand that sat still under Alana’s twitched, fidgeted until he pulled it out from under her clasp. His arms curled around himself, a weak and limp embrace. His legs still kicked out from under him in a quickening pace- jeans shuffling with the motion. Breaths turned shallow, his chest rising and falling in an uneven tempo.

_A panic attack_ , she realized, pushing the drawing away so it sat at an angle on the corner of the desk out of view. “Okay, we won’t talk about your family anymore, alright?” she said, gently cupping his face and turning it toward her. “Can we do a different game? Can you try to breathe with me?” She inhaled then, a slow and purposeful inhalation- exaggerated so her nostrils flared and her chest expanded. She held the breath, letting her lungs sear with the stale oxygen before releasing it in an exhale- lips parting around it, body relaxing with the exercise.

“Like that. Try to do that with me,” she instructed, repeating it once more.

Jack sighed, lines digging deep valleys in his face. Distraught, his frustrations mounting. A picture that only grew with each puzzle piece discovered, and it felt as if it would never be filled in. Just a disorganized image made of scattered fragments.

He huffed out a breath, letting his arms drop to his sides, hands slapping against his thighs. “I’m going to call Johns Hopkins. See how quickly we can get him transferred to their pediatric unit in Baltimore.”

He left, offering no goodbyes and receiving none in turn- Alana’s focus trained solely on the young boy as he mirrored each breath, calming in increments- the family portrait forgotten.

Forgotten until Alana slipped it carefully into her bag half an hour later, bringing it to the nurse’s station to file within the folder. Slim, the history sparse. _(Unidentified adolescent, Room 3134, “Adam”)_ was written on the tab that extended outward, and she frowned as she plucked a pen from the metal cup beside the computer.

The nib scratched against the folder as she scrawled an addendum beneath the notation.

_Graham._

~x~

Adam was discharged from the hospital three days later.

A temporary moment, a pause from the discordant shuffle of nurses and visitors outside his bedroom door. The uncomfortable prodding as his temperature and vitals were taken each morning and night, given medication that he pinched his face at and tried, on several occasions, to spit out. A room was being prepared for him in the pediatric unit of Johns Hopkins, and soon he would be shuffled away into another corner of the world. A small sliver of the world that still seemed so immense to the young boy who had never known anything but the home adorned with yellow police tape.

He still sat in his self-imposed silence, broken only in the late hours of the night when his lips were loosened in sleep and his mind turned to the nightmares. He did not speak of his own volition, but he was, if nothing else, warming up to the few people who had been a constant in his life during the last week of it- chaotic and strange, and who could fault him for his quiet? For his socially avoidant tendencies and the moments he fractured with the pressure of it all- withdrawing in his anxiety?

Only a week had passed and it would take _time._ Considerable amounts of it to undo what had been done to him. The medication helped to mellow him, even if he resisted it and grimaced at the bitter taste when a pill sat for too long on his tongue. The rest would follow, Alana was certain. A treatment plan and goals hesitantly made with the hope of progress that would come.

And she _was_ hopeful; where once he had regarded her and Jack with distrust- like a startled animal that was prepared to lurch in attack or run the moment a gate was left open- there was now recognition. Tentative acceptance.

He would speak in time. Once he felt safe for perhaps the first time in his life. Once he had a kind and loving home.

So Alana filled the quiet between them, chattering as she helped him pack what little belongings he accumulated in his stay at the hospital. She sat on the chair beside his bed, folding the too-large clothes into small squares that she passed over to him. He considered them for a moment before methodically placing them in the duffel bag- _meticulous_ , she noticed, keeping her observant gaze low. Hoping he wouldn’t see the scrutiny she leveled at him, his muscles taut in self-consciousness.

“How do you feel about leaving?” she asked, tipping her head to the side as she watched him chew the question, brow furrowed in consternation. “Are you scared?”

His eyes remained trained on the inside of the bag, slowly cluttered with the arranged clothes. He avoided eye contact almost pathologically; one of many behaviors that she struggled to define. So many behaviors that were indiscernible between response to trauma or a matter of development.

After several crawling seconds, he frowned, rolling his shoulders in a half-hearted shrug.

“It can be scary. But we’re going to make sure you have a good home to go to,” she said.

He stood abruptly from where he sat cross-legged on the bed, sliding off the mattress and wandering through the room. There was a small collection of things on the provided desk- stuffed animals and trinkets the staff gave him. Charmed by his dark curls and stern expression- too contemplative, too severe on such a young face.

He reached for a stuffed dog, the limbs swaying as he pulled it through the air. A gift from Jack, she knew, though neither had acknowledged as much. It had simply appeared in his room one evening, as if from nowhere as she returned from a phone call coordinating his transfer as Jack kept him company.

She smiled as he crossed the room once more, holding the stuffed toy out as if clutching a prize.

“A dog? You want a home with a dog?” she asked. His lips twitched, slow to pull into the wide grin that eventually spread across his face, rounding the apples of his cheeks. He gave an emphatic nod. “Well, I’ll make sure Jack adds it to his prerequisite.”

Satisfied, he dropped the toy inside the bag, its soft and tufted ears poking out between the zippered opening. He turned again, repeating the same path as before to the desk and its surface of goodies. He shifted through the gifts, touching them with almost reverent care and her smile faltered, waned as she watched him.

“Are you going to miss your old home? The one Jack and Bev found you in?”

He pretended to ignore her, steadfastly avoiding her direction as he picked up a pack of flashcards, flipping through them with insincere attention. A mundane gesture somehow made petulant.

“It’s okay if you will. It was your home. But you know why you can’t go back there, right?” she asked, folding her hands over her lap. It was difficult, understanding just how much he knew and to what depth. If he knew the gravity of it all, the sheer not-rightness that had been his entirety. How difficult it was to establish a new definition of _normal_ once it had already been so corrupted.

“We’ll find you a home. One that’s safer and nicer. You’ll be happier there- I promise,” she said, smiling over the top of a cotton shirt, cinching the sleeves across the back before dropping it in her lap and folding it in half. _Hopeful._ “First you’re going to stay at a different hospital though. Just for a little bit. This one’s far away from here, but it’s closer to where I live so I can be your doctor and Jack can keep helping you.” _Looking for your mother_ , she corrected, the woman still unaccounted for. The child known only as _his brother_ taken with her.

But it was a topic she stepped around, for the time being, meandering instead to idle chit-chat. Detailing the day ahead of them to make the trip less surprising. A preparation of things to come.

“We’re going to have to take a plane to get there. The first time I ever went on a plane, I was so nervous I threw up before we even took off. I was sixteen and my French class was taking a trip to Paris, and I had never been on a plane before. Being on one for so long? I was a mess,” she said in a laugh, recalling the memory with fondness. She leaned over, placing the shirt in his bag- trying to mimic his own particular packing in his absence as he still fiddled with the flashcards.

“It’s not so bad though. Now I find them kind of relaxing. I take the time to work on stuff I put off or read. I don’t have too much time to read, so it’s a nice excuse,” she added, reaching for the last few garments left in the plastic trash bag. Loose socks, tucked into balls; an adult-sized sweater bearing the insignia of the FBI. One that had been draped over his shoulders as he was escorted into the back of the ambulance- still covered in blood and dirt. “Don’t worry, though. We have special permission to board first and I’ll be right with you the whole time. And the doctor gave me some medicine for you to help you sleep through the whole thing-”

“No!”

She startled at the singular word, the sweater falling from her grasp to sit in a pile at her feet. She blinked at him in surprise, as if unsure of whether or not she had heard him correctly. Or at _all_. “No?” she repeated.

“No!” he spat, the word spoken with such vitriol- as though it were poison being flung from his tongue- that she stilled, shuddered beneath the weight of it. His brow was wrinkled in his anger, face flushed. His lips were parted, heaving breaths spilled between them. The cards still held in his hands were buckling under the tension of his constricting muscles, folding inward.

“You don’t want to sleep? Why not?” she asked, pushing herself up from the chair to walk towards him. He flinched at the sound of her step, the motion sending the cards to scatter on the floor. Illustrated cards meant to teach younger children how to read with word association but that Adam had regarded with little interest. Laminated cards spilling over his feet, stylized illustrations of animals staring up at him with wide and glossy eyes.

He didn’t answer, shaking his head rapidly so the tangle of curls sprung with the motion- repeating the word over and over in a mantra or a prayer. _“Nonononono.”_

“Okay, that’s fine. You don’t have to, okay?” she said as she approached, bending at the waist and bracing her palms on her knees to bridge the difference in their height. “I won’t make you, I promise.” She tucked the information away, slipped it between the folds of her brain for deeper perusal. A reminder to add to his file.

Or, she supposed, a warning.

He sprung forward then, feet kicking the cards out even further in his haste. He wound his arms around her in a tight embrace, his face tucked away from view.

A too-tight embrace, skinny arms pinching across her abdomen as though trying to sever her in half.

Yet she made no attempt to remove them, her breaths strangled and uncomfortable but _well enough_ that she didn’t wish to disrupt him. She returned the hug, sliding her palms down his spine in what she hoped was a soothing gesture.

~x~

The kitchen was filled with the aromatic smell of glazed carrots simmering in a pan, a rack of lamb roasting in the oven. It was fragrant, the sweet and spicy scent of rosemary and cinnamon a delectable perfume as Hannibal waltzed around the space, preparing the final touches of his meal. Fingers pinched the stem of his wine glass, swirling it delicately beneath his nose to release the bouquet. A Chianti, the floral notes nearly forgotten in the rich scent of tart berries.

Vivaldi played through the speakers, the chirp of violins a bright burst of noise, disrupting the relative quiet. A quiet otherwise punctured by the shrill ring of his phone.

He gave a cursory glance to the orzo and vegetables set upon the stove before reaching for the phone. “Hello?” he answered, his tone cheerful.

“ _Hello, Hannibal,”_ came the crackling voice- warm and familiar. _“It’s Alana.”_

“Alana?” he questioned, the words a playful tease as he cradled the phone between his ear and shoulder. He began cleaning the countertop, arranging his knives and prep tools onto the thick cutting board before crossing the kitchen to deposit it in the sink. “I’m afraid I don’t know an Alana. I did once, but it was a time long ago.”

Her laughter burst through the speaker, a bubble of sound. _“Message received. Sorry for not calling you since I left. This case has been...difficult,”_ she said in answer, her voice turning solemn as she spoke, ending on a disparaged sigh.

“I only jest, though you still owe me your company one evening when you get back. It’s not often I get stood up for dinner,” he said, recalling her last-minute cancellation on him almost a week prior- a call she made from the airport as she waited for a flight to New Orleans. Decidedly rude behavior, but it was an allowance he made for her, sympathetic to the demands of her career with the FBI.

Intrigued by it well enough to smooth out whatever ire might be inspired by the cancellation. His own profile work with the unit was limited, second opinions offered to Jack Crawford over a glass of whiskey or wine- in his office or dining room.

“ _I’ll hold you to it. I’m in Baltimore now,”_ she said, quiet before she added, _“My flight arrived about two hours ago. I’ve been caught up with intake at Johns Hopkins.”_

“Intake? Is everything alright?” he asked, letting the words linger; weighing them with the proper amount of concern.

She sighed, the breath of air a sharp and jarring crackle of noise that filtered into his ear. _“I’m fine. Just finishing up my work on this case. For today, at least.”_

He hummed, busying himself with the task of cleaning his counters. They were unsoiled, cleaned frequently throughout his prep and cooking but it gave his idle hands something to do. “Tell me about this case that has you so withdrawn and spread thin. The discovery of the mass grave in Louisiana, correct? Miss Lounds has been writing quite passionately about what she’s deemed the _House of Horrors._ Though her details are rather lacking- unusual for one so wily,” he said, glancing once more over his food and giving it a perfunctory stir before lowering the heat of each burner and the oven.

A low yet steady heat, enough to keep it warm without overcooking. Satisfied, he turned to rest against the counter, reaching once more for his glass of wine.

“ _Freddie can only skirt the law for so long, and Jack’s been working double-time to keep a tight lid on the investigation. He gets especially protective when children are involved. We all do.”_

He sipped his drink, the rich and dry wine washing over his tongue as he considered her words. Yes, such cases were tasking on the BAU, and he was already anticipating the extended visits the man might pay him now that the case was coming to a close.

He hummed, eyes narrowing as he recalled the few articles Freddie had written on the case- her talent for writing so much on so little was truly something to be admired- and his head tipped to the side in his recollection. She waxed poetic about the death of so many, lamenting the boys who meant such an untimely end within the small home.

All but one boy, a sole survivor rescued from the blood-rich floors of the home by Crawford and his team.

“If memory serves me right there was a child who survived. Is that not a cause for celebration? Even if a bittersweet one?” he asked.

“ _That’s a loaded question. He’s the reason I’m here in Hopkins. He’s been transferred. Jack wanted to keep him close for therapy and for the proceedings of the case,”_ she said.

“Transferred? So far away from home?” he asked, pushing himself away from the counter. He plucked up the wooden spoon from where it sat on the rest, dipping it into the saucepan as steam billowed up.

“ _He doesn’t have a home. Not anymore. He was the killer’s son.”_

Hannibal stilled at the words, the wooden spoon held in its path partway through stirring the orzo, the grain slowly filling the gap left in its trail. “The killer’s son?” he repeated, resuming his stirring once more. “How curious. And his mother?”

At that, she left out a bitter, humorless laugh. He envisioned her sitting on the chair outside one of the many intake rooms- a small plastic thing, uncomfortable for any duration beyond three minutes. She would be slumped forward, dark hair cascading down to conceal her face from view, chin propped in her hand and elbow digging bruises into her thigh. Exhausted from her work and pity in equal measure.

What a tiring role she played.

“ _Your guess is as good as ours. He won’t speak- either from trauma or developmental delay. And every time we get him to answer a question we just get about five more in its place,”_ she said, the words strung together in quick succession. A ramble, incoherent thoughts voiced aloud in her fatigue. _“He claims to have a brother too. With his mother, wherever that may be.”_

“At the risk of sounding maudlin, I imagine neither of them are with us anymore.” A growing family that was difficult to control and contain, the patriarch’s secret crimes threatening to spill out into the world. It was possible they posed a security risk, killed out of necessity, and tucked away to some other place. A place less sacred than the soil of the yard turned into a cemetery.

Fed to the predators that lay on the banks of the bayous of Louisiana, even. Not offered so much as a burial- turned into little more than carrion.

“ _Maudlin, but probably right. All the boys have been accounted for. No other bodies discovered so we can’t officially close the case,”_ she agreed. Had they reached the same conclusion? Tentatively considering the case closed even if unofficially? An unaccounted for mother and child as good as dead?

“Still clinging to hope that your survivor might have a home to return to?”

She didn’t answer, quiet a moment before saying in a soft voice, _“Adam. We’ve started calling him Adam.”_

“You don’t know his name?” It was not an entirely preposterous notion. She said the boy had yet to speak- raised by a cruel father and unidentified mother. A woman lost to the plight of an abusive relationship so that her existence was blotted out from the world and she was forgotten.

Or a victim, he considered. Plucked from the streets and held captive, begetting the man sons without documentation.

Had that been it, then? Unseen and unaccounted for because that was precisely what Graham wanted?

Had her death been something as mundane as dying in childbirth, no doctors or nurses to tend to her as her blood stained the sheets? An unassuming and accidental death eclipsed by the violence of the home?

Theories he considered, yet he voiced none of them, tucking them behind his teeth for now. He would discuss them in time, he was sure. But for now, he let his focus linger on the single survivor of the home, an outlier with nothing but a temporary name and DNA that was half-corroded.

“ _Like I said. It’s been a really long case,”_ Alana said blithely.

“That it has,” he agreed, considering the spread before him. Plenty of food should company arrive unannounced- a preparation that was as much a routine as his morning ablutions. “I think I’m going to require you pay your debt to me tonight. Dinner. We can talk all about it over this new recipe I’ve prepared.”

“ _I’d love to, but I don’t want to leave him alone just yet,”_ she said, her tone writ with contrition.

“Then the dinner will come to you. I’m certain it will taste just as good in to-go containers in the hospital’s cafeteria even if the ambiance leaves a little to be desired. I can even bring enough for your dear _Adam_ if you think he might enjoy the company.” He was moving before she answered him, striding to the cabinet that stowed his containers. He pulled them down to the counter with a dull, resonating thunk.

She gave a small laugh. _“I’m not so sure about_ that. _But I would much rather eat whatever you’ve got than cafeteria food again. Are you sure it’s no trouble?”_

“Never. I’ll be there in half-an-hour,” he promised, smiling warmly as he said his goodbyes.

They had been stepping around a courtship for months now, friendly exchanges turned flirtatious. An endeavor he pursued in earnest; he enjoyed Alana more than most. She was witty and made for excellent conversation, enough interests shared between them to prevent it from falling into something banal or stilted. And she was amusing; so diametrically different from himself- kind and nurturing. Loving.

There was a thrill in such corruption, a personal delight taken in knowing how aghast she would be if only she knew what he truly was but she was simply too blinded to see. Too fooled by his carefully crafted facade.

What an opportunity he was presented with, he thought with glee as he packaged the finished meal- making small concessions in presentation as he fitted it in the portable stoneware. She would be charmed by such a cordial gesture, delivering hot food to her as she doted bedside to her newest patient.

A patient Hannibal was curious of, taking care to package an extra serving in case the boy was amiable to his company.

Nameless. Alone.

_How tragic._

Did he know what was happening within the walls of his own home? The crimes his father committed, the sins of the father made fluid until it might drown the child within its oppressive waves. What sins was he the victim of, tormented by a sadistic beast lurking within the shadows?

A home with _Do Not Cross_ emblazoned in thick, black lettering, deterring all trespassers from entering what had become the subject of much scorn and gossip. A family and home turned into a pariah by the small community. A father too dead to properly take the blame that would otherwise fall on the boy’s shoulders.

So many questions, and Hannibal was eager to study him. A lab experiment for his own perusal, a personification of psychiatry’s greatest question: was nature or nurture more prevalent in creating the self?

Would Adam inherit his father’s cruelty and bloodlust? Raised in a home that had known nothing else? Was there any nurture to be found at all?

How curious he was, unconcerned with whatever traumas _Adam_ might have endured. Concerned instead by the secrets kept locked behind his tightly pinched lips. Did he know the boys? Playmates or ghosts trapped within the walls? And what of the mystery of the unaccounted for family?

He knew nothing of the boy- too little to even posit theories as he drove to the hospital that had once been his old stomping grounds. How old he was, his cognitive or developmental state. Delayed, Alana had said. Traumatized. So many words loaded upon his narrow shoulders and Hannibal preferred to reserve judgment for himself- hopeful he might meet him.

Would he know, he wondered? Would he see the shadow that mimicked the shape of a man and know that Hannibal was a monster like his father? A different sort of monster, but a monster all the same?

Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad if he did.

Perhaps he would find comfort in it, having known nothing but monsters.

Perhaps he would feel at home among them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So currently I’ve been very invested in this story so I’m going to tentatively put it on the following update schedule: the first and third Wednesday of the month (second and fourth already being held by a current WIP) Any deviation from the schedule will be posted on my twitter/tumblr. There is one exception- there will be, shall we say, amuse-bouche chapters in between the real ones on occasion that will NOT follow the update guideline. So the next update will be March 17th but keep your eyes peeled for a little something something in between now and then ;)
> 
> NEXT UP: Hannibal visits the hospital with dinner in tow, finally meeting Adam who seems unusually wary of him


	4. Entr'acte Number One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief interlude.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Related to this chapter, I added the tag "implied domestic violence". I know it might seem a tad bit obvious given the nature of this fic and how dark it is, but I still added it. As usual, nothing is explicitly shown- any deviance from such will be given a warning in the front of the chapter.
> 
> In addition to that warning, all the chapters labeled as an "Entr'acte" will, for the time being, be glimpses of Will's childhood written in the same manner as they are here with any appropriate warnings listed in the author's note.

There was a time when his childhood hadn't been so terrible.

Not kind.

But he hesitated to consider it cruel.

Or maybe that was simply the bias of a baseline that started out low only to sink lower and lower until he was cowering in a closet with agents and crime scene technicians stamping across the only home he had known.

It sat somewhere in the distant, nebulous periphery of his memory, this not-kind but kinder childhood. Limited to the lines of their property, he never deviated from the fenced-in backyard- the metal fencing falling to the side, gaps missing from the linked cage that he could have cheekily used as a loophole to the rule but never did.

His mother never left the house either.

He rarely saw his father. The older man with his mercurial moods slept well into the morning, Will always mindful of his play and his steps on the old floorboards to make as little noise as possible. He worked late, disappearing into the shed that sat on their property but was beyond the perimeters of the fence. He'd return to the house often and without warning, as if settling into a routine would make him lose his stranglehold power of the household. He preferred the unpredictability of arriving as he pleased, startling Will's mother with his sudden presence.

Still, it was nice enough when his father wasn't around and the scent of alcohol was stale and fading. His mother read to him, cared for him the way a mother should.  _ Babied him _ , his father accused, spitting it with such malice that sometimes Will shirked from her caresses to not displease him by accepting such coddling.

He missed each aborted touch.

But he  _ liked _ making his father happy. It was easier when he was happy- and sometimes he would be rewarded with a quiet day or, if his dad was in an especially good mood, a trip down to the water to fish.

There was solace found in such trips, escorted beyond the property lines. Each excursion felt like a privilege, a secret he was the keeper of. The sun was hot and the air humid, his clothes dampening with the sweat that made his curls cling to his face and fan about it in frizzy, broken strands. It smelled like damp, sodden earth, the iron-rich scent of the water. Like blood but sweeter. The saccharine scent of decay.

Sometimes his mother would come fishing too, and those days were especially wonderful.

The memories were fuzzy though, fading with age. Like photos yellowing, the cardstock slowly bleached away until one's face looked as if it had been swiped away with a thumb. It was growing harder to recall his mother, the sight of her each morning as she dressed him for the day or each night as she bathed him and read to him. Her voice was already stolen, forgotten entirely.

There was one memory that was vivid though. Technicolor sharpness while everything else had been reduced to sepia.

Calcified in his mind, preserved in amber.

The day began normally enough. A bowl of cereal eaten as he knelt in front of the couch, cartoons playing on the television set. She sat on the sunken cushion seat behind him, folding a basket of laundry. The perfume of detergent clouded his head, mingled unpleasantly with the sweet taste of the sugar-laden breakfast. That was how the day continued; chores performed in the background of his life. He rose on occasion to speak with her, rambled on something nondescript and pointless as they ate their lunch together. White bread with bologna and slices of bright yellow cheese, each bite sticking to the roof of his mouth.

There was nothing remarkable or notable about the day.

How unfair, it seemed in hindsight.

His father descended down the hill to the shed returning off and on until he stayed, sitting in front of the television while she prepared dinner.

He remembered the smell concisely. Fish roasting in the oven, seasoned rice stirred in a pot on the stove. His nose tickled with the heat of the spice and he pulled his shirt over his nose, grimacing at the scent.

"Can I play outside?" He asked, standing beside her as she diced vegetables for a salad.

She glanced down at him, her face drawn in a permanent scowl. "Okay. But dinner will be done soon so not for too long."

He smiled, darting out the kitchen and into the backyard, the screen door screeching as he passed through.

He found his soccer ball- old, the black hexagons peeling away to reveal the tough fabric beneath- and rolled it beneath his foot. He kicked it around, chasing after his own passes. He wasn't allowed to play with other kids, had no friends to visit so he was used to his solitary play.

Twigs snapped beneath his steps as he crossed the yard, chasing and kicking after the ball. It was late enough into the day that the sun was less of an oppressive force, sinking low into the horizon. The air was cooler, the occasional breeze wafting against him.

A pleasant evening, and he reared his foot back, leveraging his weight forward so he kicked the ball as hard as he could.

It cut through the air, spinning rapidly. Far enough that it fell down the slope of the property and disappeared down the hill.

Will groaned in frustration, eyes narrowing accusingly at the fence that bracketed him in. Like a smile, teeth missing where it fell to the side.

He hesitated where he stood, glancing at the home behind him. He wasn't allowed beyond the fence but he had so few toys. They were poor, his father was quick to say. He needed to take care of his things because they didn't have the money to replace them.

If they were gone, then they were gone for good.

He stole a surreptitious glance to the windowed wall of the house, his mother absent from the peeling frame.

If he was quick- if no one saw him…

He was running down the hill before he could talk himself out of it, sliding and skidding when the slope became steeper than he anticipated.

He was out of breath by the time he made it to the shed, the building painting a grim silhouette before him. Too small to be a home, it reminded him of the mausoleums he had seen from the car window on the few trips he took in his dad's truck.

He stared at it, frozen in place as his chest rose and fell in panted breaths. His ball sat at the base of it, his eyes falling on it. He walked the rest of the way, kicking the brambles and leaves out from under him.

He could hear the sound of the stream, sluggish water churning over stones- mingling with the chirp of cicadas. He had never been so close without supervision, and it was disorienting to wander through such territory. The familiar made unrecognizable in his solitude, seen through a different lens than he had been accustomed to.

Thrilling, even if his heart thrummed an uneven staccato in his chest as his anxiety coursed through him. Frightened that the relative peace of the scene might be shattered by the sudden boom of his father’s voice, chiding him for breaking the rules.

Punishing him for it, and he quickened his pace.

He crouched down as he approached, hands clasping either side of the ball when he stilled. His lips pinched together, brow furrowing at the strange sound disrupting the quiet.

Not the shouting of his father; it was far too muted for that. A delicate brush of noise curling around his ear and he recognized it almost instantly. The muffled sound of tears; cries quieted behind walls and buried in forearms.

Dropping his ball, he walked around the perimeter of the shed, raising a hand to brush his fingertips against the siding as he went. He turned the corner, coming to a halt in front of the wide double doors- held closed with a chain and padlock, the rusted device hanging from the handle as if in a warning.

He reached a hand outward, wrapping his fingers around the lock and pulling it once. It resisted, plucked from his weak grasp so it swung and smacked against the wooden doors. They shook in their frames, the sound resonating as it trembled across the small building.

The crying came to an abrupt end, punctured with a soft gasp.

Will frowned, tipping his head to the side curiously. “Hello?” he called out, gaze lowered to a gap between the door and the frame. The bottom hinge had snapped apart, too rusted to withstand the tension from use. The door separated, and he dropped to his knees, lowering himself to peer between inside the shed.

His eyes scanned the sliver of space stretched out before him- the bottom of a work table and stool, laden with projects. Buckets of paint piled up in a corner, a dirty blue tarp draped over them haphazardly. Then he caught sight of  _ him _ .

A boy, tucked in the opposite corner of the clutter and discarded projects. He carried himself in the same position Will himself was lowered into, dropped onto his belly on the floor to peer through the slots in the door. His hair- blond, dirty and matted as it brushed over his brow- obscured his eyes even as they searched for Will’s, tear stains streaking down his ruddy face.

“ Is someone there?” he asked- the words a whisper.

Will’s breath hitched in his throat, lips clamping tightly together as he watched the boy. Paralyzed by the fear that clutched at him, fingers curling so dirt clumped beneath his nails. His world was so small, consisting only of his parents in their self-contained universe- removed from all others. His tongue felt thick, too swollen to speak even as the boy sought him out.

“ Please...get someone. Get help,” he begged, the words desperate. “I want to go home.”

It was as if the word had been a trigger, spring-loading him into action. He pushed himself from the ground with a huff, kicking the door in his startled panic.

“ Stop! Come back!” the boy shouted behind him, the words a crackle against the otherwise calm ambiance of the evening. Distorting the rush of the river and croak of insects, the rustle of leaves beneath his steps as he ran back up the hill.

His breaths were short bursts of air, chest rising and falling rapidly as he panted with each step further and further from the shed. The wind whipped past him, blotting out the cries that waned in the distance.

Yet he couldn’t stop himself from glancing past his shoulder, looking at the cluster of trees that grew like a thicket around the shed.

He shouted when he fell, stumbling on the overturned edge of the chain-link fence, the toes of his sneaker catching in the diamond-shaped hole. The force of the collision knocked a breath of air from his lungs, eyes pinched shut as his face made contact with the thick metal links. The  _ thwack _ of the impact echoed around him, ringing in his ear.

He whimpered as he slowly pulled himself up, instinctively pressing a palm to his cheek only to recoil as he brushed against the abrasion. Blood stained his hand, smeared across the dirt-mottled skin.

He was slower as he crossed the remaining distance, wincing with each step that made his ankle sing in new pain. But he was back within his yard, coddled on all sides by the fence that had so maliciously tripped him for having breached its perimeter. It felt safer, staying within the lines of his property. Tucked within the small and private corner of the world.

He climbed the steps to the porch, pulling open the screen door in a slow and careful motion. The wooden door behind it was kept open, allowing for whatever breeze to shift through the home, yet he closed that behind him as well. A firmer barrier, a tangible divide between him and the outside world.

His mother stood at the stove, turning on her heel as she heard him enter. “Will, keep the door-” she said, her words dying on her tongue as she caught sight of him.

"Will, what did you do?" she admonished in a hushed whisper as she strode to him, crouching beside him and cupping a hand to his jaw as she turned his face to peruse, eyes widening at the dirt and blood that bloomed over his face. He didn’t answer, his shoulders sagging with each breath- his heart still an unsteady pulse that reverberated within him. Her gaze slanted to the living room, the dim chatter from the television a backdrop of noise. She turned back to Will, reaching for him as she said in a sigh, "let's get you cleaned up before dinner."

He was still quiet as she picked him up, hands gripped beneath his underarms. She set him down on the counter beside the sink, turning the faucet on and reaching for the roll of paper towels. The pipes groaned with the rush of water, hesitating a moment before it sputtered out into the metal basin below.

He watched as she dampened the towels, bringing them to his face and carefully wiping away at the grime, her other hand holding his chin in place.

It stung, the pull of the towels dragging on his scraped flesh. He ignored it well enough, grimacing through the pain. "Mama?" he said, his throat finally clear of whatever had cluttered it, his heart a steady and even thread once more.

"Yes, baby?" She asked, setting the crumbled wad aside as she prepared another one.

"Who's that boy in the shed?" he asked, his words mirroring the same quiet tone she spoke in. A secretive whisper, voices mellowed to not carry over into the adjoining room.

Her hands stilled, lips flattening. Her eyes met his own, wide and imploring- searing with something unfamiliar, too intense, and he averted his gaze from it.

When she next spoke, her voice was quieter still, pitched in the beginning ebb of panic. "Will, you know you’re not supposed to go outside the yard. And you’re not supposed to lie either."

He frowned, brow knitting in frustration as he leaned forward. “I’m  _ not _ lying, mama. I went to get my ball and there was a boy-”

“ Shh, Will!” she hissed through her teeth, shushing him with a furtive glance over her shoulder to the living room. She returned her gaze to him, fingers twisting the sodden napkin in her hands- blood diluted with water slipping in beads down her wrist as she fretted. “Stop making up stories. Don’t make me tell you again,” she said, her tone sharp even as it trembled over something he couldn’t quite name though felt crawl up and down the length of his spine.

_ Fear. _

He slumped back against the counter, kicking the cupboard door below his swinging heel. “I’m not lying,” he mumbled in resignation, though he knew better than to press the matter. So he said nothing more about the boy in the shed, sitting in stilted silence at the dinner table as his father came out to join them in their meal. Yet he could not stop the slanting of his eyes to the window that overlooked the yard and the tipped-over fence like crooked teeth in the jaw of some giant beast.

Could not stop hearing the echoing cries that rang inside his head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We now return to our regularly scheduled programming. Thank you.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I'm back on my bullshit and decided to make it everyone else's problem. Anyway:
> 
> For updates, sneak peeks, artwork, and other fandom content, visit my [Twitter](https://twitter.com/_Renee_Hart) or [Tumblr](https://reneehartblog.tumblr.com/)


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